


Unkindness

by aqd



Series: Halloween Countdown 2017 [8]
Category: D.Gray-man
Genre: Alternate Universe - Witchcraft, Dark Magic, Halloween, M/M, One Shot, Ravens, Short One Shot, Witch Hunt, Witchcraft, Witches
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-26
Updated: 2017-10-26
Packaged: 2019-01-23 16:53:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,503
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12511928
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aqd/pseuds/aqd
Summary: For the first time Lavi sees him up close. He’s afraid, but even in his fear he has to cast his eye down.The witch is beautiful.





	Unkindness

**Author's Note:**

> Here am I with the 8th and final part of my Halloween One Shot Countdown, a day earlier than expected. I have a lot to do tomorrow and also I can't wait to upload the final part.  
> Have fun!
> 
> trigger warnings: dark magic, grave desecration, stakes, body horror (not really, but I don't want anyone to be uncomfortable)

The first time Lavi sees the witch is on the day he nearly dies.  
  
It’s in the deep of winter and he miscalculates the thickness of the ice on the little lake deep in the forest. Everything is fine until he hears a dull crack and then there’s water all around him and coldness threatens to devour him. He fights and kicks the water, but his soaked clothes drag him down. His fingers brush over the ice cover and then he’s lost in cold darkness. His movements grow weak and his lungs scream for air and he’s certain that he’s going to die, until brightness erupts in front of his eyes, illuminating the ice cover. He sees it melting and suddenly his clothes lose all their weight. He reaches the surface and when he crawls back on the ice he feels several invisible hands dragging and shoving him until he’s out of the water.  
  
He gasps for air and his vision slowly darkens. The last thing he sees is a dark figure in front of the paleness of the landscape and sky.  
  
“Who…?” he whispers and loses consciousness.  
  
When he wakes up, he lies on the side of the lake and his clothes are dry.  
  
And his right eye is gone like it has never been there in the first place. He touches the sunken eyelid with trembling fingers and a single raven sits on a top of a tree and looks at him. It tilts his small head, calls out and flies off.

 

The second time Lavi sees the witch is on the morning after the day they buried the mayor’s wife. He wakes up at daybreak and restlessness nestles in his bones, like so often in the past months since he lost the eye. He gets up, dresses and leaves the small house he and his grandfather live in. He wants to walk to the hill next to the church and watch the sunrise, because it clears his head and soothes his heart.  
  
But then he sees the dark figure at the village’s cemetery. He stops dead and even though he’s too far away he just knows that he’s watching him. He heart rages in his chest and coldness spreads out in his whole body. He should scream, but he can’t. Instead he watches and seconds pass by until he sees movement out of the corner of his eye. He turns his head and falters. The trees surrounding the small village are full of ravens. Branches bend under their weight and their dark little eyes are fastened on him.  
  
It’s silent for another moment and then all of them call out and take to the air. Lavi crouches down and protects his head, but their voices fall silent after the blink of an eye and when he looks up all of them are gone. He stands up and looks around, but the sky and the trees are empty. So is the cemetery.  
  
Instead of going home and waking up his grandfather his feet start to move. He walks to the cemetery, shaking terribly. In the end he does wake up his grandfather, and the rest of the village.  
  
The grave of the mayor’s wife is reopened and her dead eyes look through him. Her abdomen is open and her unborn child is missing.  
  
Lavi screams like he has never screamed before in his life.

 

The third time he sees the witch is on the day they burn the old widow. He knows that she’s innocent and it’s atrocious. He wants to do something, but his grandfather stops him, because his red hair is already reasons enough for the terrified villagers to shun him.  
  
Fear circulates through the village and everybody suspects everybody. The last years were ridden by bad harvests and weak livestock and the eyes of his fellow citizens are anxious and their cheeks hollow.  
  
The old widow screams and screams and screams and he squeezes his eye shut, fists clenched and lips pressed together. Suddenly she’s not the only one who’s screaming. The sky darkens and hundreds of ravens dance through the air and their many-voiced call lies heavily on his eardrums.  
  
The same dark figure, who took his eye and the mayor’s dead child, stands at the edge of the woods and raises a hand. Downpour erupts and it’s so strong that Lavi barely sees his grandfather, who’s standing right next to him. They join hands and together they run over mud and puddles and flee with their fellow citizens into the church. The rain stops as fast as it has started and the stake is extinguished. The widow is dead and the ravens are gone, together with their master.

 

The fourth time Lavi sees the witch is nearly one year after the day he lost his eye. He walks through the forest until the treetops are so dense that hardly any light comes through. He still keeps walking, even though he knows that he’s probably going to pay with his life. But his grandfather is ill and Lavi can’t lose him. He can’t.  
  
He doesn’t hear him until the witch is right behind him and for the first time Lavi sees him up close. He’s afraid, but even in his fear he has to cast his eye down.  
  
The witch is beautiful.  
  
His hair is long and as dark as his eyes, which examine him thoroughly. His facial features are pristine and he looks like Lavi has always imagined an angel. Unearthly and sublime. But there is something dangerous and unfathomable in his eyes and Lavi’s sure that he’s going to die. But flight is not an option, not with his ill grandfather.  
  
“My grandfather is going to die and I will do everything, if you save him,” he says, voice trembling. The witch looks at him and Lavi notices that his hair softly moves, although it’s completely windstill. It nestles to his cheeks and swirls around his shoulders.  
  
“How much are you willing to pay?” he asks and his voice is deep and smooth and goes right through Lavi. His lips shake, so do his hands. He has thought about this question.  
  
“What do you want to have?” he asks instead and the witch softly frowns.  
  
“Blood,” he answers and a raven lands on his shoulder. “From now onwards at every full moon.”  
  
“How much blood?” Lavi asks and his heart is a little lighter, because he’s not going to die today.  
  
“Not enough to kill you.” The witch steps closer and it takes all of Lavi’s might not to step back. He holds his hand out and Lavi doesn’t move.  
  
“Deal?” he asks and Lavi shakes his hand. He wants do draw back, but the witch suddenly closes his other hand around his wrist and Lavi hisses in pain. He stumbles back as soon as he lets go and stares at his wrist. The skin is unblemished and not burned, like he had feared.  
  
“What was that?” he asks in horror and the raven on the witch’s shoulder calls out.  
  
He doesn’t answer and vanishes between trees and shadows.

 

The next morning Lavi finds a thin vial with a dark thick liquid on his pillow. He opens it carefully to smell at it. He turns his head away in an instant and has to gag. It smells like death.  
  
His grandfather coughs in his sleep and Lavi examines his pale face for a few seconds. The old man grows weaker and weaker and he has nothing to lose.  
  
He prepares turnip puree, adds the liquid and stirs the meal carefully. Then he sits down on the edge of his grandfather’s bed and wakes him up. The old man complains about the taste, but he still allows Lavi to feed him.  
  
His grandfather recovers within a few days and Lavi is so relieved.

 

From now on he sees the witch on a regular basis. He appears out of thin air and more than once Lavi blinks and he sits on the edge of his bed. The moonlight flatters his features, but Lavi’s still on edge every time.  
  
The first time he’s terrified and shakes the whole time, but it doesn’t even hurt. The witch lays an unblemished cool hand on his chest and examines him.  
  
“Close your eye.” He hears the voice clearly in his head, but the witch’s mouth stays closed. Lavi darts a look to his grandfather, who’s fast asleep in his bed on the other side of the room. Lavi blinks at the witch.  
  
“Please don’t kill me,” he mouths soundlessly and closes his eye. For a moment nothing happens and then the witch presses his hand down hard enough to push the air out of his lungs. And suddenly Lavi levitates a hand’s width over his bed, hauled up by the witch’s hand, which doesn’t even touch him anymore. He falls back down on his straw mattress and feels all of a sudden dizzy. He opens his eye and the witch examines him. Lavi raises his brows questioning and in honest bewilderment and the witch pulls a vial out of his wide sleeve.  
  
It’s filled with an dark liquid and Lavi needs a moment to understand that it’s blood. His blood.  
  
“Four weeks,” the voice in his head says and Lavi blinks and the witch is gone.

 

A year passes by and then another one. Graves are desecrated on a regular basis and a young woman gets attacked by a famished wolf on an autumn day. She miraculously survives, but her long hair is gone when she comes to herself.  
  
“It’s all about bargain,” the witch explains one night without moving his lips. Lavi’s grandfather is fast asleep and his grandson can’t stop looking at the witch’s dark eyes. He takes his share of Lavi’s blood and leaves.  
  
Sometimes he takes a strand of hair, sometimes tears. Lavi gives him eagerly whatever he wants. Sometimes he visits the witch in the dark part of the forest. Sometimes the witch takes him home.  
  
The witch’s home is perfectly hidden and full of vials and vessels. Dried herbs hang from the low ceiling and in the middle of the small cabin stands an old cauldron. Lavi sits cross-legged on the floor and watches magic unfolding in front of his eye. Sometimes the witch sends him away and the only reason he’s willing to give is _mortal danger_.  
  
Lavi gets used to the ravens and the touch of hazard. He loses his fear and all that is left is a weird feeling in his chest. He goes every day to church and prays every night, but nothing helps. The feeling grows and roars every time the witch looks at him and the soft smirk on his lips tells Lavi that he knows.  
  
The first time their lips touch is the most beautiful feeling Lavi ever had. It erupts between their lips, darts over his whole body and settles in his chest. He still goes to church, because it would be suspicious to stop, but he doesn’t pray anymore.  
  
His grandfather stays healthy and so do their fields, while the harvest of their neighbours is poor. Both of them get shunned and things look bad until one morning all fields are green and the livestock is as healthy as never before. The only downside is the fact that every single grave on the cemetery is desecrated.  
  
It’s weird that death and gore result in bountiful harvests, but Lavi has long stopped questioning things. The villagers celebrate and nobody is suspected of witchcraft for a while.

 

His grandfather finally dies. The witch tries everything he can, but the old man’s time has come and Lavi can’t stop crying for days. The witch sits on the edge of his bed every night and the sight of his face calms him down a little. Sometimes he lies next to him and Lavi doesn’t remember why he was ever afraid of him.

 

The tide is turning after somebody follows him into the forest and sees him talking to the witch. He returns home unaware and they attack him from behind. The trial is short and Lavi has never been so terrified in his life before.  
  
They pile up woods in the same afternoon and Lavi tries to be brave, but fear triumphs. They tie him down and as soon as he sees the torch he’s screaming.  
  
A single raven lands on his shoulder and Lavi falls silent and starts to cry in relief. The sky darkens and thousands of ravens dance through the air and call many-voiced. Their call scared him in the beginning, but now he recognises the melody in their voices. It’s morbidly beautiful.  
  
The ropes slide down his hands and legs and he’s free. He stumbles down the stake and the villagers scream in horror, because the witch emerges out of the forest.  
  
“I’ve run out of patience.” His voice is deafening and a few villagers fall on their knees and cover their ears, but it’s useless. The voice comes from within. “You love to burn my kind and yet everybody you killed was nothing more than a mere human.” His movements are full of grace and Lavi fails to see how anybody can be scared of him. His eyes are very, very dark and they wander to Lavi. “Leave.” The voice is so much softer and more silent than before. It caresses his ears and Lavi smiles at him. “I’ll follow.” Lavi starts to run and disappears between trees. He still hears his voice. “This is the land of my kind and you have never been more than tolerated.” Many-voiced screams resonate and it makes Lavi’s skin crawl. He runs as fast as he can. “Since you love burning humans so much, why don’t you do the same to yourself?” The sky reddens and the screams are terrible. They cease soon, but Lavi can’t stop shaking.  
  
He waits in front of the witch’s home and jumps to his feet as soon as he hears the first ravens. He’s shocked, but still not scared. The witch steps onto the small clearing and examines him.  
  
“The village?” Lavi asks and a raven lands on his shoulder.  
  
“Gone,” he answers and softly frowns.  
  
Lavi’s eye is full of tears and he slowly nods. “They burned my mother,” he says and his voice trembles. “A few weeks after my birth. And my grandmother. And my neighbour. And the shepherd’s son. And the old widow. They burned so many of them. And they would have burned me and so many others after me.” He inhales shakily and wipes his cheeks.  
  
The witch steps closer and Lavi falls into his arms. He cries against his shoulder and the witch’s eyes are very dark and very soft.  
  
“Can we leave and never come back?” Lavi asks silently and the witch nods. They’re surrounded by ravens, who strike up their terribly beautiful song.  
  
In the next second they’re gone and it is perfectly silent.

**Author's Note:**

> This was the shortest one shot of the series and also the very first I wrote in summer. It's short, but kind of my favourite.
> 
> I want to thank you very much! I had a lot of fun writing these one shots and sharing them. I always looked forward to Friday and more than once this pleasant anticipation helped me through the week.
> 
> Have a nice weekend and see you soon!


End file.
